She had a well turned figure1,
full hips,
and hunted for men around
the Madeleine2
From the way she said "Dearie3,
do you fancy me?"
I saw that I was faced with
a novice...
She had the gift, that's true, I see that,
she had the idea
but without skill a gift is nothing
but a filthy habit...
sure, one doesn't become a hooker
the same way as one becomes a nun,
at least that's what they preach, in Latin,
at the Sorbonne4...
Feeling filled with pity
for the loose girl,
I taught her the litle
tricks of her trade...
I taught her the way to quickly
make her fortune
by moving the place where her back
looked like a moon...
For in the art of street-walking.
I admit,
the hard thing is to correctly understand
how to play the buttocks...
One doesn't wiggle one's bum
the same way
for the owner of a hardware store,
a sexton, and a civil servant...
Quickly instructed by
my good offices,
she vested me with a share
of her takings...
We helped each other mutually,
as the poet says,
she was the body, of course,
and I the brain5...
One evening, after some
doubtful goings on,
she fell victim to a
shameful illness...
then, with the most friendly intentions,
as a proper young lady,
she passed me half of her microbes.
After some painful injections
of antiseptics
I gave up the rôle of systematic
cuckold...
It didn't matter how much she sobbed and cried,
how much she howled6 at the top of her voice
as I was nothing but a bastard,
I became a decent man...
As soon as she'd lost my supervision
my poor friend
sped off to experience the brothel's
shameful practises...
Apparently she even sells herself to cops,
such decadence!
There's no public morality
in our France any more...
1. lit:waist turned on a lathe2. La Madeleine is a quartier asdministratif in the 8th Arrondissement of Paris. It get in's name from L''Eglise de la Madeleine (St Mary Magdalene's Church). The church is on the site of a synagogue siezed in 1182 by Philip II and consecrated as a church dedicated to Mary Magdalen. Over the next 747 years the building had a somewhat chaotic history: much attempted rebuilding (little success); fell down at least once; was rented to a wine-merchant as his place of business by the National Assembly set up by the revolution towards the end of the 18th century; planned by Napoleon to be a temple of Glory to the French Armies, but he changed his mind and decided it would be just an ordinary church after the Armies' glory had been somewhat dented by the Russian campaign of 1812; when the Bourbons were restored Louis XVIII wanted it to build it as a church dedicated to the expiation of the sins (if any) of Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, and Elizabeth de France; after the next revolution (1830) Louis Philippe first planned for it to become a railway station (anything to put down the senior branch of the Bourbons) but then decided it should instead become a simple parish church. The architects and stonemasons had different ideas, and when the bulding work was completed in 1842 it was a very impressive looking building (see
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89glise_de_la_Madeleine#/media/File:%C... and https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89glise_de_la_Madeleine#/media/File:La... )
It was re-consecrated in 1845.
But it was in pretty bad condition by 1992, needing substantial repair just 150 years after the building work was completed in 1842. The police formally declared it a hazard to safety in 2011. It's estimated that it will cost more that €80Million to repair it... 3. "My rat" is a slang term of endearment4. a university in Paris5. lit: head6. lit: brayed